Wireless communication may be used as a means of accessing a network. Wireless communication has certain advantages over wired communications for accessing a network. One of those advantages is a lower cost of infrastructure to provide access to many separate locations or addresses compared to wired communications. This is the so-called “last mile” problem. Another advantage is mobility. Wireless communication devices, such as cell phones, are not tied by wires to a fixed location. To use wireless communication to access a network, a customer needs to have at least one transceiver in active communication with another transceiver that is connected to the network.
To facilitate wireless communications, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) has promulgated a number of wireless standards. These include the 802.11 (WiFi) standards and the 802.16 (WiMAX) standards. Likewise, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) has promulgated standards to facilitate wireless communications. This includes TIA-856, which is also known as Evolution-Data Optimized (EV-DO). The European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) has also promulgated a standard known as long term evolution (LTE). Additional standards such as the fourth generation communication system (4G) are also being pursued. These standards pursue the aim of providing a comprehensive IP solution where voice, data, and streamed multimedia can be given to users on an “anytime, anywhere” basis. These standards also aim to provide higher data rates than previous generations. All of these standards may include specifications for various aspects of wireless communication with a network. These aspects include processes for registering on the network, carrier modulation, frequency bands of operation, and message formats.
In order to provide for better wireless network coverage in certain environments (e.g., indoors, or congested areas such as stadiums and arenas), smaller, lower power network access nodes (a.k.a., sub-cells) may be deployed within the coverage area of a higher power access node (a.k.a., macrocell). These sub-cell access nodes may be referred to as, for example, femtocell base stations (femtocells), picocell base stations (picocells), Home evolved Node Bs (HeNBs), and/or Enterprise evolved Node Bs (EeNBs). Since sub-cell access nodes use the same air interface frequencies as the macrocell, and are located within the coverage area of one or more macrocells, sub-cell access node transmissions can cause interference with communication between wireless devices and the macrocell.
Overview
In an embodiment, a method of operating a communication system includes determining a first indicator of a first distance between an access node and a first sub-cell access node. The first sub-cell access node is located in a coverage area of the access node. Based on the first indicator of the first distance, a first allocation of air-interface resource blocks to be used by both the access node and the first sub-cell access node is selected.
In an embodiment, an access node has an access node scheduler. A sub-cell access node is located in the coverage area of the access node. The sub-cell access node is located a first distance from the access node. The sub-cell access node has a sub-cell scheduler. A management node is in communication with the access node scheduler and the sub-cell scheduler. The management node determines an allocation of air-interface resource blocks to be used by both the access node scheduler and the first sub-cell scheduler. This allocation is based on the first distance.
In an embodiment, an access node is configured to use a first allocation of resource blocks. A sub-cell access node is configured to use a second allocation of resource blocks. The first allocation and the second allocation have an overlapping number of resource blocks to be used by both the access node and the sub-cell access node. The overlapping number of resource blocks is dependent on the distance from the sub-cell access node to the access node.